


Mindoir

by Seagoatink



Series: Survival Isn't Pretty [18]
Category: Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: Mindoir, Rewrite
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-05
Updated: 2020-08-05
Packaged: 2021-03-05 19:21:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 9
Words: 6,778
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25730503
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Seagoatink/pseuds/Seagoatink
Summary: As 16 year old Cheska Shepard loses everything, she shows an incredible skill for survival.
Series: Survival Isn't Pretty [18]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/606415
Kudos: 2





	1. A Happy Family

Breeze rolled through the wheat fields outside. In the setting sun's light, it was like ocean waves in yellows and greens. Inside her prefab room, Cheska logged out of her laptop. Her studies were finished for the day and it was almost time for dinner with her parents and siblings.

Tonight they planned to eat outside by a fire. If the quiet night allowed it, they would play a few games or tell stories. Afterwards, Cheska planned to return to her room, watch a few vids and see if her older brother, Joey, forwarded any of his college studies to her. In between vids, she would read a few paragraphs or articles. Before getting distracted again.

Her mom knocked on her door, signaling dinnertime before leaving to round up Cheska's siblings. She went to the kitchen to wash her hands and help set the table, knowing her dad was washing up in the bathroom after a long day tagging livestock in the fields. In the hallway, her 10-year old sister pushed past her to wash her hands first and handle the food. “Wash up the lettuce, like I asked you to, Ezra,” their mother reminded the younger daughter. 

On the way to the cupboards, Cheska almost tripped over her little brother, Alexander. He ran around the kitchen, then under the table as their mom tried to catch him by the back of his shirt to wash him up.

Dinner came and went, followed family time around a fire outside. There was not much of a breeze, so everyone sat comfortably without smoke drifting into their face. As Ezra became antsy, Cheska walked over to her sister. “Pesky human! I’m a big, old, and ornery krogan! Gr!” She exclaimed. She hunched over the girl and held out her hands like claws. “I’m gonna get you!”

Ezra squealed with delight and ran behind her chair. “I’m not a human! I’m asari! I’ll beat you up!” 

Alexander fussed his way out of their mother’s lap and grabbed up at the air in front of him.

Cheska kept her younger siblings busy as the eldest brother spoke with their parents about his studies. Once the younger two were worn out, their dad took them inside to wash up and tuck them into bed.

In the morning they would go to the farmers’ market with their mom and help carry produce. Their dad would go with Joey to check on his work in town as an engineer and maintenance intern at the power facility. That left Cheska at home to sleep in and rest up alone. If she woke up early, then she planned on studying for upcoming tests or reviewing previous projects while the prefab was empty.


	2. The Haunting Stillness

The morning sun glittered in through the large second story window of Cheska’s room. As she stretched, she kicked the covers from her legs. It was nearing noon, far longer than anyone would have let her sleep in. Being the teenager she was, she shrugged it off. Extra sleep was always something to be grateful for and she was not going to let it go to waste. 

There were no messages on her omnitool or at her personal computer. Cheska went to take a shower, truly making the most of her quiet morning and soon-to-be afternoon. After drying up and getting dressed, she realized how still everything in the prefab was. It was unsettling. Had she known what an unnatural stillness felt like, she would have recognized it as such.

Instead, the teen checked for new messages and found none. She looked to the window and saw no one, not even in the fields. While the wheat still flowed amongst itself, it looked… Wrong. Cheska went to Joey’s room to check his message terminals. Maybe there was something he would have received that she did not.

He had taught her how to hack doors, terminals, and omnitools but she was not nearly as skilled as he was. But Cheska knew enough to let herself into his room and access his comms. As part of communications’ security, he had more access than most of the colonists. A few messages mentioned blips on the radar that could not be explained by regular ships coming in through the relay or from neighboring planets and systems. 

After reading two more messages, equally bogged down in possibilities and protocols, Cheska heard movement downstairs. She locked the door to Joey’s room and sent silent pleads for her life to whatever would listen, because logic said she was dead no matter what happened.

Something more effective was necessary though. Something tangible that would not just slow down the presumed pirates, but would throw them off her trail.

Her omnitool could process and run a dozen security functions, more than she knew how to run. Cheska opted to download and wipe the terminal to her device. Then she could run programs while on the run and keep hope that someone would find and save her. 

The thud of boots clunking about in the hallway told Cheska her precious time was about to end. So she turned off the terminal's monitor, then opened the drawers under the bed and sealed herself inside.

It was stuffy and hard to breath. Her brother's folded clothing crammed her against the back of the drawer. While Cheska was grateful of her thin-enough-to-fit-in-a-drawer physique, she found her bony elbows were quick to ache.

The intruders were in the room, she could tell by their footfalls that reverberated through the bed frame. Their voices were shockingly close.

The girl squeezed her eyes closed in fear.

It felt like hours went by as they searched and talked and lollygagged in a language she could not understand. It was not any human language, nor the language or any council race. Cheska wanted to find relief in the facts, but her racing heart decided not to still. 

All three pairs of feet walked out of the room, eager to violate the rest of her family's prefab. The door sealed itself closed again. Cheska would not have heard it had she not been listening so intently, but she did. And she pushed the drawer open from the inside. Cautiously, she crawled out and attempted to stretch the aches away for just a moment.

Then the door opened and in walked an alien, who's attention was still in the hallway as the door closed behind him. He had four or six eyes, she could not quite tell, and was a solid foot taller than her. Logic abandoned Cheska an hour ago, with oxygen deprivation in her brother's forgotten school uniform drawer. Had it not, she would have grabbed the alien's gun and threatened him with it.

Instead, the girl pulled him further into the room. She grappled his arm and hoisted herself to his head, her foot dug into his thigh as she levered herself up his torso. Then she wrapped her bony fingers around his neck, knitting them together like webbing before she fell behind him with her weight and gravity bringing them both to the floor.

When she rose to her feet, Cheska thought the alien was dead for sure. But panic and pure survival instincts already set into her system, overriding any thoughts she had on murdering someone. She picked up the pistol from the alien's waist and shot him without a thought as she opened the door to the hallway.

The prefab was unnaturally still again. But empty aside from her and the man Cheska turned into a corpse.

The sun was still golden and shining in the sky, beautiful among the pillowy clouds surrounded by blue atmosphere. It was picturesque, lovely even, Cheska noted as she slipped out of the prefab. The vids never set something so shocking and gruesome under a blue sky. It should have been orange, like the fires that should have been set through the crops. But it was not.

This was not a vid. It was not a dream. It was today on Mindoir and Cheska was alive.


	3. Cut the Comms

Outside of the beauty of Mindoir, her home planet, was the reality that everything she knew and loved was under attack by aliens. With the breeze at her back, Cheska shimmied in between her family's prefab and that of their shed.

The pistol she managed to find was now glued to her hand.

Her wide, green eyes scanned out to the comms tower. It was down the hill and past a large wheat field. Joey's messages already told Cheska that it was a prime target for the planet's attackers, but she also knew it was the only way to call for help.

Getting down the hill undetected was harder than she thought it would be, but she made it. Army-crawling through the wheat field took more time than she had planned too. But when alien shuttles zoomed by overhead, Cheska used it as an excuse to rest her sore muscles for just a moment and steady her breathing.

She prayed her dad and brother were safe with every inch of ground she covered on her way to the comms tower. But the pistol in her hand reminded her these aliens were armed.

Cheska decided to focus on them, rather than the fact that her mom and younger siblings had gone to the market, a heavily populated area, and not made any contact.

The comm tower, once Cheska made it there, was almost empty. Almost. An alien stood ready at the employee entrance. He had a bigger gun, and used both hands to hold it in front of his body. Being an untrained civilian, Cheska missed her first shot. Quickly, she fired thrice more and luckily made her mark in the alien's shoulder, then hand as she charged him. 

If there was one thing she learned from vids on krogan, it was how to properly throw her weight and make it count. Not that krogan fought like that, but that was how other races fought krogan.

Using her brother's access codes on her omnitool, Cheska let herself inside and locked the door behind herself. Light from outside only reached the top half of the room, leaving the rest in deep shadows. Something told Cheska that the floor was littered with bodies, not just boxes, but she refused to turn a light on and confirm the suspicion.

What mattered was that the terminals were still intact. Upon finding the proper terminal and inputting Joey's codes, she gained access to an Alliance frequency.

A small victory.

"Can anyone hear me? Is anyone there?" Cheska asked into her omnitool, only to hear her own small, cracked voice echo faintly. The glow of her device lit up enough of a corner for her to see her neighbor Devon sprawled across the floor.

She turned away, but stayed crouched behind the desk. Hope and faith felt like fiction now. 

"Who is this?" A woman's voice responded. She did not sound uncertain, or comforting. She sounded rigid and on edge.

"I'm… I need help. I'm on Mindoir, a human colony-"

"I bet it's another batarian hacking comms again," another voice cut her off.

"I killed one and stole his gun. Everyone at the comm tower is dead, I think," Cheska fought herself at every word. She tried not to hesitate or stutter.

"You think? I bet you're a fucking batarian! Cut the comm!"

"My brother worked at the station and my dad was visiting him at work today. I just caught a glimpse of my neighbor, Devon, who is either dead or about to be, so yeah I think. And I'm not gonna turn on the damned lights to confirm it. So call me a coward, but I'm only 16! Fuck yourself and help me, dammit!"

Outside there was smoke, and the smell began to permeate the tower. Cheska crawled over to one of the windows and peered out. The smoke had to be from the North, because she could not find its source or decipher how close it was.

What she did know was that Alliance chatter certainly picked up. But the door she came through opened. It was not Alliance there to save her. It was an alien, a batarian, Cheska now knew, and she blamed the dead guard in the doorway she killed herself for their presence.

She hid beside a desk and pulled Devon's… corpse over her waist. "I'm gonna die," Cheska whimpered to herself, allowing herself weakness as more batarians entered the comm tower.

A hand slipped over her mouth. "Sh," the weak whisper of Joey hit her ears. "It'll be OK," he promised.

Tears welled in Cheska's eyes from fear and surprise and relief. She laid down on the ground and faced a wall or box as she bit her lip.

Then a shot rang out and Cheska knew it was not from her stolen pistol. She knew it was close. Adrenaline rushed her system, and her heart pounded in her ears.

Two more shots fired.

The batarians spoke amongst themselves and made their way out of the main entrance to the building. When the door clicked closed, Cheska realized her brother's blood soaked her clothes and she cried.


	4. Help Me

There was not enough time to mourn or even think about her brother's death. The comm tower shook violently and the glass window Cheska looked through minutes prior shattered. She squawked in surprise and fear.

"Help!" The girl begged into the comms. "Help, please, help!" 

Shock from the bomb nearby told her to run, but her brother's lifeless body at her feet begged not to be left alone. Cheska, drenched in the blood of her brother, neighbor, and heaven knew who else, gripped the dead batarian's gun tightly in both hands.

She rose to her feet and ran for the door.

The soft, purple light littered sheets of clouds in the sky by the time Cheska stopped running. She was not sure of where she was, but she knew somewhere along the way she twisted her ankle and made the rest of her journey difficult.

Her whole body was shaking with stress and exhaustion. She had not eaten at all the entire day, and after the day's events, she did not want to eat ever again.

She yawned and sat down against a tree beside a deep ravine carved out by a thin creek. On a bad day, she typically told herself "tomorrow will be better," but now? If tomorrow was not better, Cheska knew she'd be dead.

Away from her shady trees, she saw gunfire and silhouettes, but she closed her tired eyes. It was not until she heard feet near her position that she fought like her life depended on it, to open her eyes. She jolted to the best ability and licked her dry, cracked lips. Her heart pounded violently into her ribs when she realized about five people were at her side and surrounded her.

One quickly pulled the pistol from her hand as another searched for whatever wound was the source of all the dried blood in her clothes.

As Cheska's vision cleared, she recognized them all as humans. 

"Can you tell us what happened here?" The man who took the pistol asked.

"I…"

"Are you wounded? Where did this blood come from?" He asked.

"One question at a time, Commander, she's traumatized," the human checking her over scolded.

"My brother," Cheska sobbed at the reminder. "He's dead. He… they killed him."

Another human crouched down beside her, ignoring her rightful hysterics. She checked the teen's omnitool. "This is the one who fixed the comms," she confirmed.

The one examining Cheska made it to her ankle and quickly had it yanked away.

The shots in the distance were getting closer. "Can you walk?" The commander asked.

Cheska nodded, but nearly stumbled down the ravine when she moved to walk. The girl did not realize what happened until she was over the commander's shoulders. Arm on one hand, leg in the other. The position may not have been comfortable, but no one had to slow down for an exhausted colonist.

They were headed for the docking bays. Cheska managed to figure out after contemplating options. Being jostled around made it hard to think. The market was on the way to the docking bays. She could not decipher the radio comms through the blood rushing in her ears, but Cheska knew that was where her mom and younger siblings were this morning. The rest could be deduced from there.

There would be corpses, both Alliance and batarian. And civilians too. Her family was likely among them, just like at the comm tower. The teen wanted to close her eyes and shield her mind from the dead faces of those she spoke to only yesterday. Of friends. Of family. It was a feat she could not manage as she found herself scanning the booths and buildings and streets for any sign of someone alive. Some sign of hope.

That dream of finding someone else alive was just that. A dream.


	5. Too Much Action

Corpses told the story of what happened when the batarians came. Hard light corrals surrounded dead colonists and a few Alliance members who lived at the station near the docks. The batarians must have fired on them once the military inside the corral tried to hack the system and free themselves. Near the buildings, shops and stalls, masses of people stacked on top of each other in front of once-locked shops. Others were huddled behind stalls for cover, shot for resisting capture, or for firing back with whatever they had to attack. The streets held less bodies to cross, but the scene was still grim. People running from the mass hysteria were clearly shot in the back and were felled on the spot.

Cheska’s family was not in plain view among the gruesome sight the commander carried her through, but they were somewhere along the mess. She could feel that truth in her heart and it carried sorrow so heavy she felt like bricks were pressing her firmly into the commander’s shoulders. 

One of the soldiers noticed her wide eyes linger over the corpses that littered the marketplace. “We shouldn’t have brought her through here, sir.” As she jogged to his side, she motioned with her arm to the bodies scattered about. 

“There wasn’t another option. This is the quickest, safest way to the base. You know that,” he chided.

Fate seemed to hear him, and the soldier ahead of them triggered a landmine.

“You had to jinx us!” The commander’s second swore through the ringing in her ears.

Both the commander and his lieutenant recovered quickly, but Cheska had padded his head with her stomach and likely bruised or broke several ribs. Her body had been throttled against a barricade and her neck narrowly avoided the rebar from concrete ripped open from an earlier bomb. Her eyes watered with shock, but the adrenaline from missing a bomb numbed the pain. The breaks in her ribs made breathing more complicated than it was mere seconds before though, and she struggled for shallow breaths.

“Shit! Everdine, get on the comms and let them know what happened. We need reinforcements and may come into heavy fire any minute here,” the commander said sternly as he examined Cheska for severe injuries. The girl squawked with pain when he tried to pull her into his arms, but there was little choice.

The bomb definitely tipped the enemy off on their location. They would be surrounded in minutes. “We need to bunker here and hope reinforcements get here in time,” Lieutenant Everdine pointed out.

He scanned their freshly dead allies from the threshold of a prefab store. “Grab Corporal Noy, we’ll distribute his combat drone to the girl’s omnitool so we can still use it. If we’re really lucky, she’ll be conscious enough to use it herself.” The commander tucked into the store and did his best to carefully set Cheska down on the floor. “We’ve got to hole up here till help arrives,” he told her as he checked her eyes for any sign of a concussion. “Are you gonna be alright?”

Behind him, Everdine dragged Noy into the building and locked the door behind her. A few shots hit her, but bounced off her shields and armor before the door closed. “I brought Noy. Good thing you picked an engineer with tactical armor,” said Everdine as she pulled the body further into the prefab. “I’ve never been good at quick data and gear transfer, I hope you’re better prepared, Anderson,” she added. 

“Let’s hope our colonist is well enough to assist us before we get ahead of ourselves here,” he muttered grimly. 

Cheska felt lightheaded, but could hear the two soldiers bicker just fine. Her ears only rang for a minute after the explosion before they adjusted appropriately. She vaguely understood that they were staying where they were and needed to bolster their defense to survive the next hour. With Anderson’s help, she crawled over to Noy to access the omnitool. Some of the military components were not compatible with her student-oriented omnitool and its abilities, but Cheska was able to reconfigure most of the software. Given her less than ideal state of well being, they all knew issues were bound to happen, but under the heat of gun fire they would take what they could get.

The first thing Cheska activated was the combat drone, which made its way out of the prefab and into the gunfight. Using its scanners, the girl was able to tell Anderson and Everdine where a majority of the enemy holed up. In a matter of moments, the thing was shot down. “There’s… Across the… The road’n… Further down t’th… Toward docks…” Cheska managed to say between shallow breaths. She fought the weight of her head, and leaded lids of her eyes.

All her body wanted was to fall to the ground and collapse. Then maybe, she would wake up in her bed and none of this nightmare she had experienced would be real. But it was.

The soldiers left her side in favor of the prefab’s windows. They fired shot after shot after shot after shot. On the occasion, they hollered at the colonist for another drone. It’s firepower helped reinforce their position and slowed the batarians as they tried to advance on the prefab.


	6. Post-Op

Cheska was not sure when she passed out or when the firefight stopped. Only that it did. When she came to, her blurry vision only recognized how bright the room was, and that it was filled with shades of white and grey equipment. With that, she knew her location to be a hospital or medical ward of some sort. 

The girl let out a groan as the dull pain in her ribs and the sharpness in her neck ramped. “Ow, ow, ow, ow, ow…. Ouch!”

“Relax, we’ll get you more medigel, just a moment,” a soft voice with a Russian sounding accent promised softly. He dimmed the lights first though. When he came to Cheska’s side, the pain began to sink into a slight touch of numbness and euphoria. “That ought to feel better, dear,” he murmured gently.

His fingers were at the back of her neck as he felt for incisions and scarring and damage beneath the skin. Cheska could only tell that his hands were cold to the touch as they gently applied pressure. “Mm… mhmm,” she hummed. The girl closed her eyes and winced. “Ow, ow… Ow…”

“Oh, sorry. Tender, yes?”

She nodded and swallowed hard. “Where-?”

The doctor sunk into his swivel chair beside Cheska’s bed. “We’re on an Alliance cruiser, in orbit around Mindoir. I’m Dr. Letvin. You’ve been sleeping for the past few hours after surgery,” he informed her. “You took a lot of damage planet-side. You’re lucky your internal organs weren’t punctured by any of your broken ribs. Commander Anderson told me how it all happened.”

“I… I want my mom."

Doctor Letvin turned away and rolled off to his desk in favor of paperwork. "You should rest," he insisted. He refused to look up from his datapad.

Even though the girl wanted to argue, to insist she would rest easier knowing her mother was OK, she could not fight the sobering effects of medigel. Before Cheska knew it, she was asleep.

Anderson watched from the other side of the glass looking into the medical bay. Each room was sound proof, so while he had an idea as to what was said he did not know for certain.

"Commander, my office," his captain called through the comms.

He saluted when he entered until his CO dismissed the formality. "How's the kid?" He asked.

David took a seat on the other side of Captain Silvas' desk. "She's a trooper, that's for sure. Wasn't awake for long though. I suspect Letvin dodged the hardest of her questions."

"Yes, well, we've already got the best of the brass breathing down my neck over her well being. I'd at least like her name and age," he admitted with a sigh.

"Some of our own are already showing signs of PTSD, we need to get her to a civilian clinic to jump start the healing process, at the very least," the Commander pointed out.

Silvas dragged his hands over his face, pulling at his cheeks as he did so. "The press would be all over her there. The only reason med bay isn't flooded with journalists is because they're not allowed aboard," he said. The captain placed his hands flat on the desk and sat back in his chair. "It looks like we're ass deep for a while, wading through all this shit after a storm."

"Damn right, sir," Anderson agreed.


	7. Security Breach

The next time Cheska opened her eyes, the lights were already dim. The ship must have been on it's night cycle, she assumed. Alone in the medbay, and what looked to be the whole level of the ship, the girl hopped off her cot. She activated her omnitool to check the time and day and saw that 62 hours had passed since she last used the device. 

With no one around, it was as good a time as any to see the reports for Mindoir. It was a hard fight past the pounding in her head and the aching of her limbs as she made it to Letvin's desk, but she made it. She plopped down in his chair and got to work on his computer in the poorly lit room.

What she was doing was probably illegal, but legality seemed to matter not at all when she already witnessed her brother die for her. Thinking back, he was probably taking his dying breaths already, since he did not bother with the comms in his final moments anyway. Cheska groaned at the thought, but ran the inputs for her dead brother's hack commands anyway. 

A few command screens later, and she found the roster of Mindoir colonists. There were no names, except for the military with dog tags to ID them. But every listing was marked deceased, save for one. Hers.

They did not even list her name.

Cheska swallowed hard and pushed away from the desk as she felt her lip quiver. Tears welled in her eyes and she reached hastily to wipe them away, only to smudge them all over her face. "Everyone's dead," she mumbled. "I am all that's left and everyone else is dead."

The lights kicked on.

As the door opened, Cheska fell out of the doctor's chair and onto the floor. There stood one of the soldier's who saved her. The Commander. He was in sweats and held a spare pair under his arm.

If it were not for the chair tipping over sideways and rattling about, his first glance around the room would have been at her cot first. But there she was, curled up on the floor. She held her toes in both hands. She ran over them with the chair when the lights turned on. 

After seeing her on the floor, Anderson knelt down beside her. He removed her hands from her feet to inspect the damage, but ultimately knew it was not an issue. 

Then he saw the light of the computer screen and the casualty list. Just like that, he knew he had no choice but to pull the girl into his arms and hold her until she stopped crying.

And she was crying. She continued to cry. And sob. And wail. And David held her through it and rocked her gently. And he hummed a soft tune of random notes. 

He did not pay attention to how long they were like that. His shirt, that would have been soaked in sweat had he actually gotten to work out, was soaked in tears, sweat, and slobber. David sat her up and placed the pair of sweats and loose shirt in her lap. "It's not the most flashy outfit, but you have to admit it's better than your surgery gown," he said as he rose to his feet.

"Thanks," Cheska replied, even though it hurt to talk now that her throat was raw from crying. "I-"

"Questions later. Right now you need a shower. I'll lead you to the women's washroom and wake Everdine in case you need anything," he told her.

True to his word, Everdine walked into the washroom five minutes into Cheska's shower. "You picked the perfect time to wash up. All the privacy you could ask for, packed in here like sardines in space."

Cheska stared at the wall while she scrubbed her curly red hair with shampoo. "I… think I need help with my back," she croaked. It was clear she felt ashamed for needing help with such a simple task.

"Yeah, you do," said Everdine as she took a step forward. "Buncha glass was stuck pretty deep. You're lucky you can still walk," she added. "I'll be careful, but it'll still hurt."

Everdine had to help her dry off as well, and provided support while Cheska put her pants on. "Are these your clothes?" She asked in a quiet voice.

"Yeah, it's fine. Military issued. They'll reimburse me on it too," promised Everdine as they headed out of the washroom.

Letvin and Anderson were waiting in the medbay, though it was clear that Cheska's return cut their conversation short. "I need to check on your health," the doctor said as he motioned to Cheska's cot.

While Letvin gave Cheska a physical, Anderson began asking about her and her family. How old was she, how old were they. Birthdays. Addresses. Neighbors. Friends. All dead, but all important. 

"And how did you get past my terminal's security, I want to know that too," Letvin added as he seated himself back in his now upright swivel chair. 

"Joey, my brother…" she hesitated as she had to swallow the emotions that came with the fact that he was dead. "He taught me some basic hacking techniques and I installed a few of his commands to my omnitool," said Cheska. She idly swung her legs back and forth off the edge of the cot.

The three adults traded glances amongst each other, completely unsure of what to do or how to handle the situation at hand. The only thing they knew was not to argue in front of her.

"Here, let's check out the ship. A walk will be good for you after all," Everdine offered with a polite smile to Cheska.

Letvin and Anderson were visibly relieved when the two left the room. "I'm afraid I don't know how to handle this situation. We must look into transfer options, or bring someone more specialized in this field aboard," the doctor stated. He crossed his arms over his chest. Of all the situations he expected to be in on an Alliance vessel, this was far from the top of his list.

"She can't exactly stay aboard, it's a military ship and missions are classified," pointed out Anderson. "I don't exactly feel safe with kicking her off the ship either. The media will claw down her doors, and that trauma won't soon be forgotten if it comes to that."

He leaned against the cot behind him and crossed one ankle over the other. When Everdine left to help Cheska shower, Anderson and Letvin hardly knew what to think. But there would be many more long contemplations over the girl's well-being and future. That they could count on. 

Finally Letvin broke the silence. "I can keep her here until her wounds are healed. If more surgeries are necessary, and there are a few, I can hold her for longer. She is my patient after all," he decided.

"But, and this is important, she cannot stay aboard without mental health follow ups. Survivors' guilt will kill her."

Anderson worried at his lip as he mulled over Letvin's solution. He ran a hand over his face, then nodded. "I think we can make that work. Write up your report for Silvas. In the meantime I'll wake up Specialist Rio to disable your terminal," he said and pushed himself away from the cot. "We can't have her breaching security again either."


	8. Seasoned Potatoes

An asari, Umin T'Neri, arrived via Alliance craft a day later. She was 627, not yet in her Matriarch stage, but well past the maiden stage. According to Cheska, she still had her back tattoos.

She stayed with Cheska most of the day. She insisted they go for walks and talk about the girl's ambitions. Umin asked about the mundane and asked often.

Breakfast, lunch, dinner, even snacks and desserts, all posed a problem. It was foreseen of course. Umin did her best, often times guilting Cheska into eating or drinking her calories and nutrients. "I don't want to be here," the girl admitted. She sat in the mess hall across from Umin. Her eyes bore into her lunch tray. Her expression was flat and she was slouched, hunchback in her spot with her hands folded together under the table. 

"We can go on a walk, but you need to finish eating something," Umin urged her. 

"I don't want to be here," repeated Cheska, a little louder than before. 

"Eat."

"It tastes wrong," Cheska grunted. 

"You haven't even tried to eat today. You can't know that," said Umin.

To the rest of the table's surprise, she had not lost her temper or raised her voice. Anderson prodded his mashed potatoes with his fork as he listened intently to their conversation. Asari children must have been more challenging and frightful, he decided, assuming Umin already went through this process with several of her own.

"I'm not hungry. I'm not eating. I don't want to be here," Cheska informed the asari sitting across from her. "I don't want to be here."

Umin sighed. "Where do you want to be instead?"

"Mindoir. With my family," the girl grumbled.

"No. There is nothing for you there and your family is gone."

"They're not gone. They're dead. They're on Mindoir. And I would be too," she hesitated, perhaps weary of the harshness in her voice. But then Cheska whispered, "I should be too."

Anderson swore he felt his heart break for the girl he saved down on Mindoir when he heard those words. He didn't know what to say -if there even was something to be said. But that was not his job. He had no expertise when it came to kids. That was why Umin was here.

"You're right. They are on Mindoir. But you are here and you have potatoes to eat. So eat their share so you can live," Umin's voice was strong, definitive. She was sure of herself and what she was saying. And what she said, Cheska needed to hear.

But Cheska did not move. Hell, she barely blinked or breathed.

Umin let out a heavy sigh and leaned over the table. When she spoke again, her voice was still firm, but it was soft, gentle. "Remember those last moments with Joey? Eat for him. See tomorrow for him."

The girl was crying now. Her tears fell straight off her cheeks and into her potatoes, providing the most seasoning military food had ever seen in Anderson's career. He ate his potatoes and tried not to watch Umin manipulate Mindoir's sole survivor into eating.

"It hurts," Cheska sobbed quietly.

"Your brother gave you the chance to hurt and feel pain and mourn. Do you think he would not want you to heal from this pain too?"

"No."

"Then eat."

And she did. It was as close to a miracle as miracles came, Anderson assumed. He finished his own meal and reported back to his captain. There was no shortage of work, and he refused to spend every moment gawking over an asari and her patient.


	9. Release and Return

The real issue came to the Alliance letting the kid go. They refused her release into Umin's care, first without hesitation. Then the second request came with recommendations from Doctor Letvin as well as Captain Silvas upon seeing Cheska's spirits lift.

He was not very keen to keep a kid aboard his ship in the first place. But now, he had a powerful asari biotic aboard as well, and that did not bode well.

Even though Umin was ultimately understanding, it was clear that she would do whatever it took to keep her patient safe. Being held hostage by Alliance Brass when the best care could only be found outside the confines of a cruiser was not safe.

Finally it came down to Anderson requisitioning twenty students, all Cheska's age, teachers for various subjects, as well as foster parents for the girl. All to prove a point.

Just like that, she was free to go. Maybe not to Thessia, or to the Citadel, but after weeks in space, Cheska had her feet on solid ground.

Another month went or so went by before the first interview of many aired. It was from a salarian working for one of the Citadel's many news stations. He asked a handful of questions, but a majority were for Umin, who had become Cheska's handler of sorts.

Then an asari interviewer aired a few questions for her documentary as a teaser for ad releases.

Finally came an interview from a human reporter from Earth. She and her broadcaster were reportedly anti-alien. The questions she asked were all very biased in nature. The woman even went as far as to call Umin Cheska's jailer.

Anderson was worried as he listened with baited breath for Cheska to agree and condemn all but humanity for the fate of Mindoir. But she did not.

"The night before the attack, I played aliens with my younger siblings. I'd always been the krogan. And they would be asari, or salarian or something. I'd yell I'm gonna eat you! Stuff like that.

The truth is, I've always had an interest in aliens. I did all of my research papers on them. I bet I'll keep writing more. But I don't find them guilty for the fate of Mindoir."

The reporter was less than pleased and tried to accuse Umin of brainwashing. But Cheska just stood up and walked off screen.

Anderson thought that would be the last time he would see or hear of the girl. He was wrong, of course. The day she turned 18, she applied to be a marine. Her recruiter contacted him, saying she used him as a reference.

He gave her application a read through and found she had some of the best damn testing numbers he had seen in a while. It was not as though he was going to refuse her reference, but he was curious. According to the app, she spent the last year and a half at the Rucker Institute. Her engineering record was rather impressive as well.

According to the Institute's report and reference, she was a skilled engineer, capable of turning any junk into something useful. Her primary interest seemed to have stayed on aliens, though as she even had a few minor publications on interspecies relations. 

A feeling of pride welled up in the commander's chest as he read through the past two years of Cheska Shepard's history. It was a history she would not have had if he had not saved her. He thought of when Cheska hacked into Doctor Letvin's terminal. Then he remembered when she had nearly been knocked unconscious but managed to override a dead soldier's drone.

Shepard was marine material. And he was going to personally see to it that she would serve with him when the time came.

**Author's Note:**

> I was really unhappy with my initial Mindoir fic. So years later, now, I decided to rewrite it after playing thru most of the trilogy again. This changes some of the confusing backstory I had for Shepard too, so I hope this provides smoother writing for me to bounce off of.


End file.
